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Our house is never quiet. The floors are full of hazardous tiny little toys that can severely hurt you. There are bits of food everywhere. We have an insane number of shoes. Most of our plants have no leaves, especially at the lower end. If your kid ever visits our place, it’s an instant play date. We have an insane number of clothes to be washed everyday. We spend more on milk and milk powder than petrol (and we have two cars!). Our helper didn’t know what she got herself into (but bless her for loving the kids nonetheless).

Some days, I ask myself if I should just stay out a little longer.

That said, I get the loudest and most rousing welcome whenever I return home. And nothing else quite matters – that is the blessing.

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About

People are always amazed when I tell them I have 5 kids.

“Wow. Are they all from one wife?”
“Oh my! What a blessing!”
“How do you guys do it?”
“Are you catholic?”
“The PAP government must love you!”
“Can you just fix the TV already?”

These are but some of the comments I get. It is not surprising. Even I am amazed that Beth and I have 5 kids.

The irony is that it wasn’t easy for Beth to conceive our first. It took us 4 years and a number of trips to the gynecologist. I was a busy traveling photographer in the highly stressed world of wedding photography and that didn’t help, says the doctor. Eventually, we welcomed our first child, Kyra. We had planned for two kids. We were about to start our visits to the Doctor (to get help again) when Beth got pregnant before any treatment and help was rendered. We went on to name our second child, Nessya, which means miracle in Hebrew. Number three, Noah, wasn’t planned but we were excited to welcome a boy into the family. We obviously didn’t learn and about two years later, Micah, joined us. I then made THAT April Fool’s joke about Beth being pregnant again and about a year later, Mikaela joined us as the fifth (and final) child in our family.

So 3 out of 5 kids weren’t planned but that said, we wouldn’t trade anything in the world to hear their laughter in the house and watch them grin and smile.